Wednesday, January 18, 2012

Cthulhu Through the Editions

I was reading Realms of Crawling Chaos last night and thought the stats for Cthulhu were somewhat weak. That prompted me to go dig out my Dieties & Demigods book (yes, the one with the Cthulhu and Melnibonean Mythos inside) and compare the stats.

Note: I haven't replicated the stat blocks in their entirety. I wanted to focus on comparing overall power)

Cthulhu usually attacks both physically and psionically. He can regenerate 10hp/round. He teleports up to one-half mile at will and is totally immune to the effects of water, cold and vacuum. He can call up from the sea 10-100 Deep Ones. He will retreat into his lair id confronted by an intact Elder Sign, another of the Old Ones (suchas Hastur) or some natural catastrophe, such as the re-sinking of the city of R'lyeh into the sea.

Nightmarish Presence (Fear, Psychic) aura 10; enemies with
fewer levels than Cthulhu in the aura take a -5 penalty to attack
rolls and saving throws. Enemies that enter or start their turns in
the aura take 25 psychic damage.

Cthulhu prefers to attack psionically, however, if he must attack physically, he will do so with his two claws. If his head is close to his opponents, he will attack with his 10 tentacles. Each tentacle is 10ft long and may attack separately each round. They flail about doing 1d6 damage and an opponent struck must Save vs. Death or lose 1pt of INT. Each 1pt of INT lost restores 10hp to Cthulhu.

The AD&D and Labyrinth Lord Hit Points are within 50 HP of each other. In 3rd edition and 4th edition, the Hit Points are inflated to double and four-times as much.

Armor Class for AD&D and Labyrinth Lord are equivalent to plate armor or plate and shield, and it is plausible that even a low level fighter could hit Cthulhu, whereas the 3rd and 4th Edition versions requires an Epic-level character to hit him.

Cthulhu is a bloated humanoid form 100 ft. high with an octapoid head and a face a mass of feelers. He has a scaley, rubbery skin, prodigious feet and curved talons on hands and feet. A pair of folded batlike wings protrude from between the shoulders.

“Ph’nglui mglw’nafh Cthulhu R’lyeh wagh’nagl fhtagn.” — “In his house a R’lyeh dead Cthulhu waits dreaming.” R’lyeh is a great sunken city of non-Euclidian geometry somewhere in the Pacific. So bizarre is its construction that anyone entering the city must make saving throws against fear and insanity. Cthulhu lies in a huge stone structure sealed with the Elder Sign (see below). If the Seal is broken and the god released, everyone in a radius of 100 miles must make a saving throw or go insane.

Cthulhu usually attacks both physically and psionically. He can regenerate 10 hit points per melee round. He can teleport up to half a mile and is totally resistant to water, cold and vacuum. He can call up from the sea 10-100 of the Deep Ones. He will retreat into his lair if confronted with the intact Elder Sign, another of the Old Ones such as Hastur, or some natural catastrophe, such as the re-sinking of the city of R’lyeh into the sea.